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The Rules of Pacers Digest

Hello everyone,

Whether your are a long standing forum member or whether you have just registered today, it's a good idea to read and review the rules below so that you have a very good idea of what to expect when you come to Pacers Digest.

A quick note to new members: Your posts will not immediately show up when you make them. An administrator has to approve at least your first post before the forum software will later upgrade your account to the status of a fully-registered member. This usually happens within a couple of hours or so after your post(s) is/are approved, so you may need to be a little patient at first.

Why do we do this? So that it's more difficult for spammers (be they human or robot) to post, and so users who are banned cannot immediately re-register and start dousing people with verbal flames.

Below are the rules of Pacers Digest. After you have read them, you will have a very good sense of where we are coming from, what we expect, what we don't want to see, and how we react to things.

Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

"People with intelligence will agree with me when I say that __________"

"Only stupid people think / believe / do ___________"

"I can't wait to hear something from PosterX when he/she sees that **insert a given incident or current event that will have probably upset or disappointed PosterX here**"

"He/she is just delusional"

"This thread is stupid / worthless / embarrassing"

"I'm going to take a moment to point and / laugh at PosterX / GroupOfPeopleY who thought / believed *insert though/belief here*"

"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

A) Start a thread about the specific incident you want to talk about on the Feedback board. This way you are able to express yourself in an area that doesn't throw another thread off topic, and this way others can add their two cents as well if they wish, and additionally if there's something that needs to be said by the administrators, that is where they will respond to it.

B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

Rule #4

Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

Rule #5

When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

An example:

If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

We cannot tolerate illegal videos on Pacers Digest. This means do not share any links to them, do not mention any websites that host them or link to them, do not describe how to find them in any way, and do not ask about them. Posts doing anything of the sort will be removed, the offenders will be contacted privately, and if the problem becomes habitual, you will be suspended, and if it still persists, you will probably be banned.

The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

Rule #7

Provocative statements in a signature, or as an avatar, or as the 'tagline' beneath a poster's username (where it says 'Member' or 'Administrator' by default, if it is not altered) are an unwanted distraction that will more than likely be removed on sight. There can be shades of gray to this, but in general this could be something political or religious that is likely going to provoke or upset people, or otherwise something that is mean-spirited at the expense of a poster, a group of people, or a population.

It may or may not go without saying, but this goes for threads and posts as well, particularly when it's not made on the off-topic board (Market Square).

We do make exceptions if we feel the content is both innocuous and unlikely to cause social problems on the forum (such as wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Easter), and we also also make exceptions if such topics come up with regards to a sports figure (such as the Lance Stephenson situation bringing up discussions of domestic abuse and the law, or when Jason Collins came out as gay and how that lead to some discussion about gay rights).

However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

Rule #8

We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

Rule #9

Generally speaking, we try to be a "PG-13" rated board, and we don't want to see sexual content or similarly suggestive content. Vulgarity is a more muddled issue, though again we prefer things to lean more towards "PG-13" than "R". If we feel things have gone too far, we will step in.

Rule #10

We like small signatures, not big signatures. The bigger the signature, the more likely it is an annoying or distracting signature.

Rule #11

Do not advertise anything without talking about it with the administrators first. This includes advertising with your signature, with your avatar, through private messaging, and/or by making a thread or post.

Probably every time he appeared in the game film. I'd assume it would happen similar to this:

"Watch Mike here guys, because everything he is doing is correct. See how he barely uses any energy while playing defense? That's exactly what we all need to do, because if we do that we can then quickly run down the court and jack up a contested three pointer. Now on this next play, watch David be a homo. Don't do anything that he is doing, because we don't need any more homos. We need more Mike Dunleavys. Just remember, Mike = Basketball God, David = Homo."

"Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better." - Albert Camus

"Appreciation is a wonderful thing. It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well." - Voltaire"Everyone's values are defined by what they will tolerate when it is done to others." - William Greider

Comment

What a thread. A coach uses a homophobic slur to a player, and some posters are more worried about other posters using the term "turd." Wow.

It's not the word, per se, but the hatefulness and hurt behind that word. Unlike yourself, apparently, I believe in true equality, which means insulting and slandering someone is wrong regardless of their sexual preference. That includes gummy's personal attack against Jim O'Brien, which I found both vicious and classless, especially considering the lack of evidence that Jim O'Brien is anything other than a great human being.

Comment

I have never once though heard a single player ever say a negative word about Brown in the long term. In fact most players go very far out of thier way to not say anything bad about a previous coach.

However in Jim's case the list of players who will line up to talk bad about him are long and wide.

There were two players on our team that I never heard say anything negative (publicly) about JOB after he was fired. (who dealt with him for longer than six months) AJ Price and TJ Ford. And being who those two players are, I have to believe it has more to do with a personal belief that you don't talk negatively about a coach, than actual feelings about Jimmy.

It's so bad, that Brandon and Roy were talking about DC having to deal with JOB this year.

I think this is just another example of JOB being JOB. Nothing shocking. Apparently He wasn't speaking to Wells either.

We are talking about classy "good" guys here. Roy Hibbert and Tyler Hansbrough type of guys. (I mean really, when Tyler talks it's a big deal. And for anything but a politically correct statement to come out of his mouth...)

I did read your first post, but your second post discarded the hypothetical. I'm sure that many fans on here are assuming that it's true. I agree with your general point that there is no place for these types of slurs.

That's what makes humans complicated beings. Al Capone opened a soup kitchen; not a good defense for his other behavior, just like Jim's work with the homeless doesn't excuse his press comments about our players or his reported behaviors.

I agree that opening a soup kitchen does not offset the criminal acts of a gangster. I like your remark about human beings being complicated because it's an underlying part of my message: Well-meaning fans may have had some philosophical differences with Coach O'Brien's coaching schemes and demanding approach, but I don't think it's right to then leap to the assumption that every single negative thing said about the man is probably true. Rick Carlisle and Frank Vogel also seem like reasonable men to me. My presumption is that Rick Carlisle would not have hired him--and Frank Vogel would not have worked for him in Boston, Philadelphia and Indiana--if he was the type of leader to use offensive slurs. That to me carries more weight than David Harrison barking for some attention on twitter.

O'Brien has never said anything in the media about his players that I have found personally offensive, but I respect that many looked at the issue differently. "Irrelevant--do it in a winning effort." "Roy needs to do better." A litmus test on who has the mental toughness to push through, because we didn't want sunshine patriots. I was fine with it and never understood all the fuss, but that's me.

I can't stand David Harrison. I think he's one of the biggest wastes of talent, but he just wrote something that could get him sued if not true. I don't know if it's true, but that's a very risky thing to say if not. And you're talking about what is fair and right, and I think that's way off base.

I'd say there is about a 1% chance of David Harrison being sued over this or other statements on twitter. I'm sure if he wanted to he could continue to smear O'Brien with impunity. And I'm sure Mike Wells will continue to draw attention to it, because he lacks the self-awareness to know any better.

Comment

It's not the word, per se, but the hatefulness and hurt behind that word. Unlike yourself, apparently, I believe in true equality, which means insulting and slandering someone is wrong regardless of their sexual preference. That includes gummy's personal attack against Jim O'Brien, which I found both vicious and classless, especially considering the lack of evidence that Jim O'Brien is anything other than a great human being.

I find it interesting that you have mentioned my comment more than once even though I was responding in agreement to someone else who called JOB a turd first, which you've seen fit to ignore. Curious.

Nonetheless, I'll own up to the fact that it's not a particularly classy thing to say. Anyone who has paid the slightest bit of attention to my posts over the years knows that I almost always refrain from name calling. But, I'm human and sometimes things slip out. I think characterizing it as "vicious" is a bit over the top, really, but OK. Most everyone else knows that I don't know JOB personally and can infer that I am not making a comment on his character off the court. From what I know of him as a coach I do not like what I've seen one bit. We have plenty of evidence that he was a bad coach and not a very nice guy at all to many of his players. I suppose that all sounds nicer than agreeing that he is a turd, so there ya go.

"Appreciation is a wonderful thing. It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well." - Voltaire"Everyone's values are defined by what they will tolerate when it is done to others." - William Greider

Comment

I have never once though heard a single player ever say a negative word about Brown in the long term. In fact most players go very far out of thier way to not say anything bad about a previous coach.

However in Jim's case the list of players who will line up to talk bad about him are long and wide.

A big difference though is that most of the time Larry Brown had talented teams that were largely shoe-ins to have winning seasons. When you win, then of course the demanding coaches are seen in a more positive light. No one cared what a bunch of knucklehead nobodies on the Knicks had to say during Brown's disastrous season. And no one cares what a nobody like Darko Milicic has to say. Guys like Ben Wallace Rasheed Wallace and Chauncey Billups are tough-minded, persistent, non-fragile types, so of course they could handle a little sparring and they're not going to run home crying to momma. Most of the players on our team have already proven that they were not of that same level. They don't have the mental toughness that a young Paul Pierce had. Heck, Roy Hibbert continues to prove it over and over and over again. I've said it before and I'll say it again even though it was blasphemy to some when I made the point a year ago--I would rather have a healthy Anderson Varejao over a healthy Roy Hibbert. His rebounding and defense and toughness are always dependable, and the guy just knows how to play winning basketball. The very fact that Roy Hibbert was so bothered by little 'ole Jimmy O'Brien was enough for me to know that the guy was not deserving of a max deal. But that's another topic, and yeah, maybe we didn't have a choice.

When O'Brien won in Boston, there was not a "list of players who will line up to talk bad about him long and wide." To quote O'Brien from the prior link....

"We had a great thing going there," O'Brien said. "We had almost an ideal situation where I loved the players. They did it with their work ethic. As a result there was a close bond of players and coaching staff. We had a terrific couple years.

"[Watching the trades] was painful. A group like that is hard to replace. [Ainge] had his reasons to tear it down and build it up to win a championship. It was too painful for me."

Said Ainge: "He's a good coach. A good person. I wish him well. I have no ill feelings about Jim O'Brien. He just wasn't comfortable in the situation he was in. I understood it."

But yes... when you are losing... even if you are in the process of overachieving in terms of the win-loss column, well, losing is still losing. And after a couple of years it's difficult for a lot of players to continue to play for a very demanding coach when the reward of winning is not there immediately.

Comment

It's not the word, per se, but the hatefulness and hurt behind that word. Unlike yourself, apparently, I believe in true equality, which means insulting and slandering someone is wrong regardless of their sexual preference. That includes gummy's personal attack against Jim O'Brien, which I found both vicious and classless, especially considering the lack of evidence that Jim O'Brien is anything other than a great human being.

This coming from the guy with the Portland Sucks avatar? Suicide capital is a 'subtle little joke'?

Comment

I have never once though heard a single player ever say a negative word about Brown in the long term. In fact most players go very far out of thier way to not say anything bad about a previous coach.

However in Jim's case the list of players who will line up to talk bad about him are long and wide.

A) I think Brown was/is a jerk and vastly overrated. Nearly every moment of success featured helpful roster changes just as he stepped in.

B) Eddie Johnson has trashed Brown with a specific story about how Reggie was busting it every practice, coming in first and leaving last, and yet Brown would still rip on him the most. The guys saw that and thought "what chance do I have if this guy thinks the hardest worker isn't trying".

Brown, like JOB, is the outdated old school jerk type that believes you must Marine boot camp style break everyone down to whimpering losers just so they will then buy into what you do and respect you as their leader. And that's been a big mistake in the era of high paid star athletes, especially the ones who have some brains and character. Tim Duncan doesn't want to hear how much he sucks, he wants to hear reason, respect and accountability.

Having said that, I agree with Peck that the line to trash JOB is drastically longer than the one for Brown. I'm just saying Brown was no saint and I really came to dislike him the more I learned and studied.

One of Brown's greatest turn-arounds was the Spurs. His first year with them he...did jack s***. His magic hadn't kicked in. But in year 2, boy did they learn from him. Like they learned how to add BOTH David Robinson and Sean Elliot in the same year due to David's Navy service delay.

Pacers only added Tony from Europe and then only added Jax. And then Brown didn't want Jax because he wanted Rose, who he then decided to prove a point to and benched him completely. Then he wanted Jax back in the very same season. This ran the team into the dirt and got his a** canned.

Brown was a classic case of "well he sure was better than the crappy coach" syndrome, where he replaced the underachieving Bob Hill who was wasting tons of talent and only got to stay because he had replaced the god awful Versace.

Brown knows some X's and O's, but he knows business and good situations even more. And he's kind of a selfish jerk.